Marilyn Kesler has recently retired after 42 years as a teacher in the Okemos, MI, Public Schools, teaching seventh and eighth grade strings and three high school orchestras. She is continues to be the director of the Community Education Suzuki program where she teaches Suzuki cello lessons.

Ms. Kesler earned a master’s degree in music education at Southern Illinois University where she specialized in the adaptation of the Suzuki violin method for the cello with John Kendall. Her undergraduate degree in music education was from Indiana University where she studied cello with Janos Starker and Leopold Terraspulsky.

She is presently chair-elect of the SAA Board of Directors. Past offices include president of Michigan Chapter of ASTA, secretary of the SAA, chairman of the SAA Cello Committee, Public School Committee, and Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association vice-President of Orchestra Activities. In 1990, she was the first recipient of the ASTA National School Educat